During the 1920s, young men from Imotski started playing sport. In addition to gymnastics, football was the most popular sport. The first football players were young men from the Bazana neighbourhood (Radoslav and Miroslav Nikolić, Slavo Mošić, Pere Ćosić and Jozo Štambak). In 1927, they acquired the first real, leather soccer ball, and then founded the Zagorac FC. They trained and played amongst each other, and their main ground was “Plac”, which was located on the site of today’s city market. Football was also played in numerous other locations, most often in the meadows in the fields below the city: Perinuša, Konjevode, Dila… A few years after Zagorac FC, another football club “IŠK” was founded. During the 1930s, a great rivalry developed between the two clubs, but both clubs closed after the Second World War.
In the 1950s, with the construction of a mini-football field next to the High School, football gained a new momentum. Among the generations of football players who acquired football skills here, Zvonimir Boban stands out, a long-time AC Milan player and captain of the Croatian national football team that won the bronze medal at the World Cup in France in 1998.
In Gradska kavana Cafe in 1953, Fulgencije Vučemilović – Fuđo, a famous sports manager who spent most of his life in Buenos Aires, suggested building a football stadium. According to him, the stadium was to be built under the Topana fortress, in the Gospin dolac sinkhole, named after the small church, located on its edge. Construction began in the second half of the 1970s, while the football pitch was installed in the autumn of 1988. The football stadium, located in a sinkhole located next to the Blue Lake, has attracted the attention of the people of Imotski, as well as all its visitors. Numerous world media recognized it as one of the most interesting and unusual football stadiums in the world, and in 2017 the BBC named it the sixth most attractive stadium in the world.
The Imotski Football Club was founded on March 31, 1991. The legendary football player from Imotski, Ante Đuka — Kris, was elected as the first president. At the beginning of 2002, Imotski FC merged with Mladost FC from Proložac. The new club became a member of the second league and during the next 15 years managed to take fifth place three times. Famous Croatian footballers Ante Rebić, silver medallist at the World Cup in Russia in 2018 and Kristijan Jakić, bronze medallist at the World Cup in Qatar in 2022 passed through the junior teams of Imotski FC.
